Adobe Edge: Wrong technology, wrong job

Do we really need to recreate Flash as CSS animation? Apparently Adobe think we do. I am not so convinced.

Adobe have just released an alpha version of something called Adobe Edge. The product enables you to create CSS/jQuery animation without writing everything by hand.

My curiosity got the better of me and so I downloaded the alpha release.

I have no intention of reviewing the product at this early stage, because it is far from ready. However, playing with the software has left me with one fundamental question – why?

Do we really need a CSS animation tool?

To understand my concerns you must understand the direction that this tool is taking. For those of us who used early versions of Adobe Flash the similarities will be apparent. Adobe appears to be recreating the animation functionality provided within Flash using CSS and jQuery.

You may consider this a good thing. But is it really? Do we really need a “flash equivalent” that produces CSS-based animation?

What website needs a tool like this?

From my perspective most website animation falls into two categories.

There are those websites which make heavy use of animation. These are typically sites for sectors such as gaming or movies. They are high impact, visually appealing sites that are more about branding than content.

Then there are websites that use animation as small enhancements. On these sites animation is not critical. An example of this may be an e-commerce site where items visually move into the basket when selected.

If we look at these 2 scenarios it becomes apparent that there is no place for a product like Adobe Edge.

CSS animation should not always replace Flash.

For those websites that make heavy use of animation the basic features provided by CSS animation probably are not going to do the job. These sites typically include large amounts of interactivity, video and sound. It strikes me that in such situations Flash is by far the superior tool and should be used.

Do you really need a tool from Adobe to create basic CSS animation?

As for sites that only use animation to create small visual enhancements, a tool such as Adobe Edge feels like a sledgehammer to crack a walnut. There are a number of simple, free, online tools that can produce these basic animations. Alternatively you can just hand code them, it really isn’t hard!

To me this just feels like another example of using the latest technology simply because it is trendy to do so, rather than it being the right tool for the job.

A tool that encourages bad practice.

Maybe I’m turning into a snob, but as I look at Adobe Edge I fear we will see the same horrors that the web experienced when Flash came on the scene. This tool cries out for you to create pointless animations that add little value to your site. Worse still it requires any animation to occur within a fixed area (no responsive design here) and produces code that many will not have a hope of understanding.

Perhaps this tool is meant for the the low-end of the market, where websites are produced using WYSIWYG editors and next to no money. However just because this segment of the market has been the domain of bad design in the past does not mean it should be perpetuated. In my opinion a tool like Adobe Edge could well do exactly that.

So what do you think? Is there a place for a tool like this? Am I just being a miserable git or worse still committing heresy by suggesting that flash should not be replaced entirely? I’m sure you won’t be shy in letting me know in the comments.

As you say Paul this has eerie echoes of the early days of Flash. The old Site of the Day galleries on Adobe all but encouraged designers to be as extravagant as possible to justify the use of the technology, and this tool will only do the same. And what comes next? Yip, the return of the ‘Skip Intro’ button.

I think that Adobe could be opening all kinds of new avenues with this tool. Of course if/when it gets released it will most likely result in a lot of horrific experiments. But isn’t this just the natural progression. Start off, make mistakes, get better. Look at how good Flash websites have become from what they were.

I think that Adobe could be opening all kinds of new avenues with this tool. Of course if/when it gets released it will most likely result in a lot of horrific experiments. But isn’t this just the natural progression. Start off, make mistakes, get better. Look at how good Flash websites have become from what they were.

It’s not snobby at all to think this the equivalent of Flash intros. I always say there’s a thousand ways to accomplish the same thing, but only a handful of ways to do it right… and this is not one of them.

It’s not snobby at all to think this the equivalent of Flash intros. I always say there’s a thousand ways to accomplish the same thing, but only a handful of ways to do it right… and this is not one of them.

Agreed. The only other area that this could be used for are online advertising on a Flash-less mobile platform such as iOS. However, in those cases there are a lot better tools out there such as Swiffy http://swiffy.googlelabs.com/ which converts existing Flash content rather than having to recreate it all using CSS/JS technologies.

dbushell

I think you’re right in that Edge will encourage bad practice, but Adobe say the final product will offer more than just animation. Used right, it will allow devs to add interactivity to base HTML that is already accessible and semantic. That’s where I believe the real value will be. I’m excited to see the next preview with events and interactivity added, then I’ll make a real judgement :) Fingers crossed!

You’re definitely NOT being a miserable git, though you’re probably right in reserving ultimate judgement until the product is finished. I totally agree that the advocates of AE might serve as useful puppets for the low-value, bad-design (not to mention bad-content) end of the market – however it might make it easier for non-coding designers to add nice details to their sites and applications.

Just as Typekit opens up to a tsunami of bad typography (a choice of fonts doesn’t make you a better designer), when used correctly it’s a very – VERY – powerful tool. Not that I think AE is anything like Typekit, mind.

Rick Curran

I share some similar concerns, especially about the quality of the code output by these apps. Also size of files and payload of the output is a concern too I think (I blogged a bit about Edge here: http://suburbia.org.uk/blog/2011/08/02/005033.html). However, like it or not Edge and the many apps like it (Sencha Animator, Hype, Animatable, MotionComposer, Fla/SWF-HTML5 converters: Google Swiffy, Adobe Wallaby and more to come I’m sure!) are going to get used a lot. I just hope that those of us who remember the ‘heyday’ of Flash Intros etc will do a lot to encourage sensible usage of the content created with these apps.

That’s right on. I think these tools do have a place. I did a simple animated slider with moving elements recently using Hype.app: http://seasonofservice.org. A few bumps along the road, but worked very well in the end.

Hadn’t heard of a few on your list, thanks for writing those out!

mattbeck

People who use flash badly will start using this to do the same bad things in js/css.

It’s probably a small improvement in that those bad things will at least display across more devices.

All in all though – my opposition to flash on sites is less about the technology, and more about the way it’s used. Flash heavy sites tend to do all sorts of things with it that would be bad regardless of how they were implemented.

What I crave is wide browser support for APNG (or something similar). The animated gif is a sad little holdover from yesteryear and should be put to out to pasture.

RichKenyon

I do a lot of front-end development and one of the things I rely on is an understanding of how the underlying code is going to work on various platforms. There is a decent amount of research that goes into programming solid interactions and being that HTML5 and CSS3 are developing technologies, the way in which we perform those interactions is changing relatively rapidly to keep up with best practices. In my opinion, website interactions convey more about the brand than website copy. I would not leave something like that to a WYSIWYG editor in hopes that it interprets and outputs my intended interactions correctly on all platforms.

mooduino

Hats off to Adobe for trying something new. Maybe it’ll work out, maybe not, but at least they’re acknowledging that Flash might not be around forever.

Realistically this tool will probably be aimed at novices. The same people that use the wysisyg editor in DreamWeaver or the Rainbow gradient preset in Photoshop. Sure it perpetuates bad design, but the people using these tools are pretty hard to convince of the value of hiring a designer to do proper design. They usually fall in to 1 of two categories. Either they can’t afford a designer to do it right or they don’t care/know any better.

Boagworld does a great job of helping readers see the value in hiring a a designer or learning to do it properly, but unfortunately Adobe is the business of selling software and not in perpetuating good taste (rainbow gradient preset).

Its like they say, hate the player not the game, or this case hate the user not the tool. Your best plan of attack is to keep educating and erode the market for tools like this.

I stopped using Flash for the most part quite a few years ago. Reason? Javascript libraries. If I need a slideshow, I’ll go with jQuery. I think Flash still has a viable market in the games category and in highly interactive specialty sites, such as movie promos. I don’t think CSS animations are good for games, however. Most html5/CSS3 games I’ve seen run slower than a flash game, though the flash game takes more overhead. I have yet to download this tool because frankly, I don’t need it. I’ll stick to code.

An example would be a website that allows student auto mechanics to interactively view how a particular auto part works. They could pull it up on any computer as well as iOS (iPad/iPhone) devices that do not support Flash and then tap on various places to get animated sequences or exploded views.

Another example would be a human anatomy website that allows you to animate muscles, joints, and whatnot. iOS devices would be excellent for that but would not be able to use the site if it is in Flash. And the more advanced features of Flash would be unnecessary.

Want another example? How about a website that gives a guided tour through a museum? Interactive, animated — and needing to be on mobile devices (again, iOS being key).

I could probably think of 20 more off the top of my head where this tool would be useful. This is just in the five minutes I spent writing this post.

I would be surprised if you couldn’t accomplish a decent looking joint or muscle animation using Edge or some future version of Edge at least. Otherwise, this whole article is moot. We’re assuming Edge has some reasonable animation capabilities along the lines of Flash.

The point is that these are legitimate uses of Edge where it has a distinct advantage over both hand coding (visual editing) and Flash (device support). Since the article fails to look at this land in between full Flash websites and minor hand-coded jQuery site enhancements, I thought I’d point it out. It’s pretty significant.

To be clear, I’m a web developer and do NOT typically use Flash. I also hand-code all my jQuery. But I have a client who had developed a ton of reasonably simple (but interactive) animations depicting human anatomy on his website. He did it all in Flash and was dismayed to learn that a significant percentage of his traffic is now iPad and thus unable to view the animations. He gets several inquiries a week about an iPad-friendly version of his site. I can see that this tool has the potential to allow him to continue to build his interactive slides and display them on all devices.

But apparently not very many people are able to get past their preconceptions. Oh well.

Armen Michaeli

Edge produces HTML, CSS and JavaScript. Which means you can do in Edge ANYTHING you can do with those. Which means whatever Web gives you. You missed the biggest selling point of Edge – it generates a website, otherwise usually “handcrafted”. There are tons of inverse kinematics libraries for the Web out there. Can’t say the same about Flash.

Črni Žec

Try to optimize autogenerated script. Let me know when you finish, maybe in a few weeks or months. ;)

Črni Žec

Now you are talking about apps and software, websites are presentations not applications.

Kimon Matara

I would have thought the lines are becoming somewhat blurred these days.

WhoWroteThis

Well your could not be more wrong to assume a website can’t be an application.

I don’t think it’s Adobe who thinks CSS Animations should be a Flash replacement, it’s some designers who do. Adobe is basically just giving them the rope so they can keep hanging themselves up with their bad practices, but this time in an iPad as well.

Not everyone will abuse it, though. Just most. Same as with Flash.

Karl Smith

The place I work for is already looking at something like this as a rapid way to create homepage banners for our site that are cross platform and don’t hang the damn browser (hello flash). Something like Edge would allow us to rapidly create subtle animations (rather than static images in a jquery “feature” slider) that have a bit more visual polish, and quickly creating them in a visual environment (they’re designers).

There’s bad uses for EVERYTHING. Those this mean this particular tool is inherently bad?

Črni Žec

MMF egzists over 10 years and is often used for web purposes, and specialy about thing you are writting. Tool is fine, still there is far better, and article does not says that tool is bad but that there is no reason for another tool when we already have more then 15 of them and two of them are standards defined by w3 consorcium.

Mohamed ElNakoury

what’s this tools ? ” already have more then 15 of them and two of them are standards defined by w3 consorcium “

Paul, as a full-time hardcore OOP Flash dev, I can say there is definitely an advantage to being able to manipulate a project both visually and in code. Right now, Edge just does animation, and yes that’s less than impressive. I share your conservatism about this particular tool right now, but there’s something truly fantastic about the Flash IDE workflow. The Flash team at Adobe have acknowledged Flash’s diminishing role in a lot of site features that JS, canvas, and CSS can now handle. If I had to do some of that stuff without the option of playing with it visually at author-time, I have to say some of the joy of the process would be diminished. Don’t get me wrong, for the most part I abhor timeline animation; but for hybrid designer-devs like myself, a halfway workflow would be like manna from heaven. Besides, one of the main things I’ve learned in my short career is that you can’t keep a stupid cheapskate form making something ugly – they’ll always find a way.

The current build of Edge Preview has a code editor for down-and-dirty editing, just like Flash for working with ActionScript and XML :)

Griff Wason

Even a company the size of Adobe can’t ignore Apple, and the sizes of the iPhone and iPad markets. This will please those creating Apps and other offering for those products and maybe others… will it have the finesse of a mature product such as Flash? No… and initially it doesn’t need to. It’s also the thin edge of the wedge… and from what I’ve heard (also from some insiders at Adobe) Adobe and Apps developers want this and need this.

Črni Žec

There is too much apps already for web animation, adobe edge will not do nothing much, people will usually stick to apps they already own. concrete, mmf, maker… and so on.

I think this is a business driven product as much as a technology product.

I think it has more to do with Apple’s refusal to allow Flash on iOS devices than anything else. And I’d say from a usability point of view it makes sense for the early Flash-like metaphor to be used as it is aimed at possibly migrating existing Flash users across to be able to develop for those devises it can’t develop for with Flash.

Adobe users can be quite loyal – as is attested to by my refusal to give up on GoLive ;-)

So I think the it is a business strategy, more than a technology play.

If you don’t want to use Edge then don’t use. nobody is forcing you.
You can create web using flash and make the user wait for longer time by displaying loading..loading..loading..loading..loading..loading..loading..loading..loading..loading..loading..loading..loading..
No body likes to wait nowadays. CSS animation rules

illiad

future calling! from aug 15, there will be NO FLASH on mobile devices… NOW what do you think??

Seems to me like Adobe thinks the web is missing badly animated site intros and has therefore created a tool to make sure someones site intro works on my mobile device. I wish Adobe would use its influence to help guide best practices instead of simply making tools that allow us all to relive our bad ideas.

It is difficult to judge the actions of others until you have given them a fair chance. Who knows, in 10 years time we may all be saying this was the best thing that happened as it may have revolutionized a specific approach to a specific goal. At worst it may allow us to learn and analyze the code that this tool spits out and then say ” This is not the way to do it”

mariexg

I disagree. I think as designers we hate this sort of thing because it looks weird and it’s hard to do. But clients want it and we want clients if we want to get paid. I am working on a site now: htttp://www.artistdesignerdeveloper.com/Don-Juan where the owner of a Mexican restaurant just wanted a cartoon of himself in a sombrero jumping up and down in front of his restaurant and it had to work in iphone. To get the job I had to agree to do that. I couldn’t find any way to make this work with video, so I a learning Edge.

Črni Žec

You could build website in java and you would have no problem – usually professional do it like that when mobile phones are in question. But again, today everyone calls himself a designer but they are to lazy to do the work in proper way.

tamcao

I have to disagree.

Even though there are different tools for different jobs,
Its really all come down to how a person uses those tools.
I’m glad that Adobe finally decides to embraces the technology.

In one corner we have the developers and the other designers,
I think Adobe Edge appeals a lot more to the hybrid crowd somewhere in between those two groups.
The visual thinker.

Flash may or may not be around as more and more people embrace the new technology. Thats just how it is, and I think Adobe is realizing that. There are both pros and cons for which tools to use.
and I’m sure there will be abundant examples of bad use of Edge.. Hopefully not something like the tons of animated gifs we see on websites 10 years ago.

In the end, you are the master of your medium. Use the tool if it benefits your design.
Don’t use the tool just because someone sat next to you is using it.

Hats off to Adobe!

Črni Žec

I know, that adobe aims on those “designers” that do not understand backend processes and have big intelectual problems learning the script language. That’s all. Those who know script language has freedom and can create whatever they like, those who will use edge, can create only what developers give them, and that is few presets and classes that you can combine, it means you will never be able to create something that you imagine, because you will need to downgrade your thinking on what edge can do, those who knows javascript do not need to downgrade anything what they imagine.

edge wizzard

edge has a vast array of tools to hand and helps with the creation of animated motion graphics for online purposes, you may have a knowledge in javascript but this only clouds your creativity as you think about the logical way of doing stuff, rather than what is possible, or whats capable within your coding knowledge. Using edge is a great tool to create parallax scrolling animated intuitive websites, which i doubt you could create or code faster than making them using edge. Brilliant tool. I am an animator with a decade of experience and its nice to see a way i can create animations i want for online purposes, using svgs, css and javascript means that people can see it fast on a poor internet connection without having to load up a big video file. the future of websites

It’s interesting to see how each one gets used and I know sometimes people just do things with these technologies because it’s possible. I think there will be good uses for Adobe Edge, especially if Flash gets edged out of the scene by HTML5 (though that won’t happen for some time).

I always think “it depends.” There’s no certainly it will suck for every situation, but it won’t always be the right tool.

I think you fail to use a bit of common sense to see why Adobe has created Adobe Edge. Adobe Edge and Adobe Flash seems to have similar purpose, they are for web animation but your question to as why Adobe needs to create a similar product when we have Adobe Flash, that is because, Adobe wants to capture those platforms that cannot display Flash such as mobile devices. Apple devices such as iPad for instance do not support Flash because Apple is frowning down on Flash and won’t support it but it has support for HTML5/Javascript based animation. Another thing is HTML5 is here to come and here to stay for a long time and will become a solid standard. So Adobe is clever enough. By providing a Flash like product that could output things in the HTML5 and Javascript format, Adobe will be able to have a wider penetration of all markets including Apple devices. Flash developers will be able to produce animations using their existing Flash skills using Edge.

You may ask.. What is in HTML5 that is capable of Flash-like capability such as animation? The answer is the HTML 5 Canvass.

Črni Žec

You are wrong, web designers abandoned flash long time ago because it was too heavy and websites needed a longer time to respond and waiting time to load page was a hell long one, and people were just leaving the websites with flash animations because noone wanted to wait for 5 minutes for page to be loaded. Edge will give them posibility to go on more platforms, but websites that use edge autogenerated scripts are not optimized and you will get alot of errors and false responses which again leads on long wait time for page to be loaded… you can try to optimize those generated scripts by hand, buthave fun with it, be sure to take 2 – 5 weeks free just to do it. so again you will lose traffic from sites you create. Edge is pretty much restricted and gives to designer only posibility to work with classes in presets, that hurts m8.

To me this is a cross-over product. My friend is a really good coder, he loves to code …..thats his thing and he has become good at it over a long period of time. I’m capable but not brilliant at coding, its a slow (although worthwhile) process for me. I’m a more visual person, so this tool looks good and I’m sure a lot of people will want this to speed up their workflow (even more experienced designers under pressure ?). I think my concern is that in making things easier for people like me, they are also kind of removing the need to learn and develop …instead it seems that we will enter the world of wysiwyg and only become aware of it’s limitations and go back to the drawing board.

To me this is a cross-over product. My friend is a really good coder, he loves to code …..thats his thing and he has become good at it over a long period of time. I’m capable but not brilliant at coding, its a slow (although worthwhile) process for me. I’m a more visual person, so this tool looks good and I’m sure a lot of people will want this to speed up their workflow (even more experienced designers under pressure ?). I think my concern is that in making things easier for people like me, they are also kind of removing the need to learn and develop …instead it seems that we will enter the world of wysiwyg and only become aware of it’s limitations and go back to the drawing board.

Anonymous

I think these are the causes that adobe have launched this software.

. arrival of new html 5 technology which don’t need any plugins like flash.
. since iphone and ipod supports html 5 animations not flash, so this one can be better option for multi support.
. since there are flash to html 5 converters available on net but I don’t know how much will it be successfull to change object oriented action script 3.0 to javascript.
Now I am going to use this software. Then I will send my another comment to you

So true. As a digital designer who has a history in know and using flash to it’s full potential, to have the industry do away with a powerful tool all because most of the web will be moving onto mobiles devices is just frustrating.
There will always be a need for high impact and highly interactive websites (games) which I still can’t see html5 handling well.

I do agree that html5 can do a good job of high impact web design but the ones that do it well have armies of coders making it happen, where as Flash is a nice simple program but has a powerful engine inside making my life doing animation while coder while making games on my own easy to do.

I have tried Edge and I was impressed by the code it exports and will definitely be a useful tool when having to animate small parts of a site quickly. But I can’t see myself making games in it just yet… there still is a gap in the market for a flash type program that works on mobiles and doesn’t kill your computer to run.

Some times simple animations can show a demo of how things come together or how they work.
Info animation. with clean design it make good communication,

Edge has liberated me with small sites that I had to hire a coder. I have yet to have a good experience with coders.
They just don’t care and don’t want to work with you. I know that’s a general statement. But that’s my experience and a few other people close to me have experience.

Is edge clumsy and messy at times yes it is sometimes it’s really buggy. But I know it’s still in bata.

Edge has a place. If I had a fortune 500 client would I use edge? Most likely no. Maybe I would use it to show the coders what I was looking for. It still has a long way to go. But hay of you have another place you can turn a designer to. I’m all for checking it out.

Well, now that Adobe is going to phase out Flash player for mobile, I think we all have to switch to HTML 5 if we want to have a job in advertising or webdesign. If you want to make apps, then you’re good to go with Flash.

Agree with Karl, the problem with Adobe Edge and crappy practices is in the heads of the crappy designers. I am stuck in a situation where we HAVE to create something that will work with HTML5, because Flash got kicked out of IOS.
It is not an option for us to leave anything behind in Flash, HTML5 or we can’t use it at all.

Agree with Karl, the problem with Adobe Edge and crappy practices is in the heads of the crappy designers. I am stuck in a situation where we HAVE to create something that will work with HTML5, because Flash got kicked out of IOS.
It is not an option for us to leave anything behind in Flash, HTML5 or we can’t use it at all.

1. However it’s written, native animations > Flash
2. We’ll end up with an IDE for HTML5 animations at some point anyway (although I was expecting DreamWeaver to get the functionality first, not some new product – but they’re just testing the waters, which makes commercial sense), so why not make it resemble and act like something we’re all already familiar with: Flash.
3. Edge is pretty basic, it’s alpha software, stop treating it like a finished product. All the “bad practice” stuff you’re talking about is going to be refined out.
4. You can’t stop bad programmers writing bad code or using tools in inefficient ways. Good programmers will do the right thing and engineer their projects properly.

stephen di michele

I think you have somewhat missed the point. Obviously Adobe think that Flash has had its day, and not wanting to be left completely in the cold, are looking to the future and ways of embracing html5.

Stick with it Adobe – I remember when Flash first appeared and all you could do was move a few sprites across the stage – this is already well on its way to becoming a market leader

I’m not a novice, and yes I use the wysiwyg tool in dreamweaver, because it lets me work faster and turnaround projects quicker.

I do a lot of sites for bands and record labels, and others that want/need some sort of multimedia and interaction. There is a need for some of us out there for a tool that can do what Flash can/did – and make it accessible to iPad/iPhone/iOS users.

ex. Audio players (yes there is jPlayer and others, but they are rather time consuming to reskin and design)

ex. subtle, tasteful animations that make the site appealing. not ALL animations are horrible 3d spinning logos – there are subtle things thoughtful animation can do to make a site/brand appear more refined and appealing.

Not all great designers are great coders or vice versa. For solo freelance workers whose skill set is heavier in one or the other, tools like Flash, or Edge (if not now, in the near future) are valuable and helpful – rather than having to find and subcontract or hire another person they allow people easier and faster ways to get a job done.

We recently restyled our company website providing a multimedia experience through html,js and css. The nature of coding issues we experienced was way beyond the capabilities of Edge: there is currently no way to adapt the content to the screen size and provision different experiences for different browser is pretty tricky.

What Edge is trying to do is adapt html5 into the older, monolithic paradigm of flash, which based on game or movie like immersive experience.
Unfortunately, the new web is fragmented and can be consumed in very different ways, from big 27″ amoled screens to tiny 3″ mobile devices.

Anonymous

I’m was a graphic designer in the 90’s. The web made me become a web designer in 2000 but when I wanted to add functionality and cool effects to my websites I had no choice but to use FLASH. But in order to use FLASH effectively I had to learn ACTIONSCRIPT. The learning curve for anyone is challenging but for us right brain designers it is very steep. I reluctantly took on the challenge of learning ACTIONSCRIPT at the time HTML when was dismissed as a container for FLASH content. Then ACTIONSCRIPT changed its entire programming language into ACTIONSCRIPT 3. Let the learning begin “AGAIN”. Then when I finally built a beautiful FLASH website with WEBSITES and FORMS I learned they had no functionality if I didn’t learn PHP and MYSQL. As the programming abyss grew even deeper Apple creates and sells millions of devices that do not recognize my website. Now I have to learn HTML, CSS, JAVASCRIPT, and JQUERY just to get the same sight that I built in FLASH to render on an iPad or iPhone. Now there are new mobile OS that I don’t even know enough about to mention here. As a designer I just want my design to look pretty as easy as possible. The left side of my brain is throbbing by trying to absorb the sea of computer code while my create oasis that use to thrive in the right brain is growing dry due to neglect. I’ve struggle with programming language for years. When I happened upon Adobe Edge while researching JAVASCRIPT tutorials I was elated. I was a bit hesitant thinking this is too good go be true. She’s everything I ever wanted or needed. She reminds me of FLASH but she’s recognized by the web without plugins. She’s pretty. The content that She produces is PRETTY. She’s not complicated. She’s from the same design neighborhood that I’m accustomed to. This is who I’ve been looking for. I love her. I’m going to dump all those other demanding, picky, high, maintenance, chicks that force me to come to their world of syntax and number lines. I’m going home with my new LOVE. Adobe Edge she’s everything that I need. She’s all that I’ve been looking for.

Črni Žec

There was an easier way. Learn javascript. Don’t know why people even bother with flash ever. You can dump whatever you want, you will still be second grade designer that refuses to learn the backend processes and that will have big problems in connecting different technologies because you do not understand what you are doing – and because of that your websites will be heavy with very long response time – and the product that edge recreates are very hard to edit and optimize for better speed speed performance which for case have that search engines will reject your websites and your clients will need to pay alot more to get on top – I mean not alot, but alot alot alot more – and that is the product of your “not knowing the job” issue – maybe you think you are happy now, but when your sites do not respond in first second, people will just leave and move on – so keep awoiding languages, and keep finding an easier way, and to build a good product, there is no easy way as you might think. Learn java and javascript.

iAmProtoss

And I bet you’re this master designer who has the creative skills of a God, all while being a nerdy code cruncher. Dream on.

There is a reason why lefties can’t get along with righties….but feel good about yourself. You help build the product…we help you land a job as a developer because we create demand for you.

obi2

I write code probably at the level of the top .1% of coders, including very low level languages.

And I still say this: Flash was great. It did things you could not *come close to* in javascript back in the day. And let’s not forget one other thing: Javascript only started to not suck in the mid 2000’s. Before that, cross platform issues were absolutely brutal to any serious development. Flash was the way to go and it’s no surprise it is *still* the world’s most widely used platform for online multimedia. (No, javascript isn’t).

Also: Javascript is a cakewalk compared to AS3 which is a real language. (Javascript is not).

Javascript is also NOT any less of a system hog than Flash. Throw in a half dozen animation libraries and oops… it’s big.

Hello . just think about that . my manager take me paper and sayed write lines of javascript and i say to him i can not do this but i’m graphic designer and could be creat with adobe edge . haha . i seem sily boy

Heidi McKay

I have clients who don’t want me to use Flash because it does not work on the ipad. I downloaded Adobe Edge from the Adobe Labs site and I have used it now a few times, I love it and my clients are happy. Flash is great and does quite a bit more at this point in time, but in order to use it you have to have several options in your code. I prefer to keep it simple. The world of the web is constantly changing and I hope that Adobe will keep working on this until it can do all that Flash does. So that designers like myself do not need to be Java Script experts to make a website with some animation.

OK
I respect your opinion BUT i see something else …. iam’ a programer developer mainly i’m using the PHP coding and MYsql or Litesql as a database so on any server any space any hosting any local network … etc .
i stop using flash since 2003 not just stop using it but hate it actually for this reason . :
i can do any thing with the coding and database and the most important make this easy for user or the web user as we can say in Flash ok i do a high quality animation and using action script can make from the animation a beautiful calculation’s and some numbers that code make a program as a game a gallery viewer or as a very effective bridge for input and output BUT . IF I WONT TO CHANGE any thing of the flash i need the source file and the program can edit the flash as source so at minimum a good knowledge-flash user to able to do this OR editing a xml file.
IN java script or jquery and Adge or any lib i can do the animation – input and output motion a part or a full any thing as flash but the main difference to me i can give the user a control panel that can change every thing – text’s images animation moving colors and can relate all that with time and location …. etc
To be honest flash have a high quality than java script and images on it that if i make the same quality in java that’s will cost me a slow view actions and animation
the other thing i have to tell that there is no problem in flash with the web browsers as in java script and css But that certainly will be solved .

There is always a market for wysiwig tools. When you say it isn’t hard to code, that’s sort of like saying it isn’t hard to speak english. It’s not hard for coders to code. Some people find HTML intimidating.

Even for coders though, WYSIWIG tools have a certain place. I love using TextMate when I’m in the middle of a complex web design project. In many ways, it’s my tool of choice. But when I want to just get some quick HTML based email out, need to massage some text or data from Office, etc. than it’s nice to have a tool like Dreamweaver in the tool box.

And while there are certainly plenty of existing competitors to Edge and there will undoubtedly be many more, the facts are no one besides Adobe has the resources and motivation to invest in the development of CSS/HTML5/jQuery advancement.

Saying there’s no reason to have Adobe Edge comes across to me a bit like saying there’s no reason to have a baby. You never know what that child is going to grow up to be.

BadKidJDD

I don’t think we need Flash Player. Even Adobe are admitting that Flash is old technology. I also think that Adobe Edge can be useful. I wouldn’t use it because I know CSS, but I can see some potential in the software, like as you said, embedding animations into websites that were created with WYSIWYG editors.

I think its a possible win, I’ve downloaded it to check it out. I am concerned however that this will be for JS /CSS animation what Dreamweaver tried to do for AJAX. It introduced a huge amount of bloating and needlessly complicated the code to achieve flexibility.

I build interactive Training Modules to educate clients on products and medicines. For the last few years I’ve built these in Flash but I’m looking at alternatives that might fill the void once we shift further towards newer technologies.

Something I’m very concerned about is cross-compatibility, audio timing and interactivity. These all have to work flawlessly to ensure every user has the same experience. At the moment the only tool I can use is Flash, but my hope is that Edge becomes a fully fledged product that offers me the same confidence in end product.

To the Author, get real.. What’s appealing about edge is its potential. Flash is dying out, and who’s to say that the future won’t be an entirely more interactive web. Tablets and smartphones have brought many new ways to interact with content, and to an extent people expect them on these devices. Unless you have a crystal ball, it seems completely arrogant to say there’s no room for a product with so much potential for creating interactive websites as this.

Hello Flash will NOT die. It’s the best multi media web tech around. HTML 5 is a baby. And Flash CS6 can produce HTML 5 code. The coolest sites on the web are Flash sites. Everytime I see a HTML 5 site I say nice that’s HTML but if it was in Flash I would say what lame flash animation. You simple don’t expect a lot for HTML 5. Flash can build games and make them work on every device out there, except a toaster. I will not by an apple portable device. Apple has limited what it can see on the web. Any tech that need a plug in will not work. There’s a lot on the list. Who needs a device like that. Big companies have flash and html sites. Apple users see the crap HTML site. Who care about this high retna screen when you can see the best stuff on the web. Ad far as Adobe edge goes i’ve used it I like it and it’s easy and fun to use. Why not have another option. Any hack can make hack work from any application.
Well that’s my too cents. Unlike Apple which don’t give you a choice to see what you want. They only want to pimp there Itune crap. Adobe is giving people choices. GREAT JOB ADOBE. THE HELL WITH APPLE. and i’m an apple user. Not a PC guy.

Although I agree that this tool would be overkill for simple animations for websites, you are forgetting that HTML5 and CSS3 are the future of tablet and mobile gaming. As it stands, Flash and ActionScript dominate this arena, but the future is bright for HTML5 , CSS3 and Javascript. One of the reasons for this is that it is already the standard for web development. Anything Flash can do, HTML5 + CSS3 +Javascript can do. It can do some crazy stuff. Remember how ID Software’s QUAKE was recreated in HTML5?

I was interested in getting into game development, but as a front-end web developer and designer I was afraid that I’d be wasting my time by taking the time to learn ActionScript 3 front to back, especially on a technology that I think is seeing it’s way to the door, let alone one that has no benefit to me as a professional designer. Luckily for me, I can continue to expand upon the languages I’m already familiar with.

That being said, don’t be too quick to think that just because something has HTML5 or CSS3 on the label that it solely has to do with web design. This tool can handle this yes, but it is going to be geared to wards tablet and mobile device developers who make games and other applications.

Črni Žec

actionscript?! as I recall java dominated this arena not actionscript, and java dominates still since it still powers more then 3 billion mobile devices which makes her a queen of all kings and queens there, actionscript lost the fight 8 years ago. Quake is not recreated nor ain html or java or actionscript, the custom plugin was made that extends the use of app and tech 2 engine, and plugins that pull the app to browsers are done in java. So as I see it the 90% commentators are designers that do not know nothing about design, and worst part is you all are trying to speak about scripting languages and you don’t even understand what is object oriented language, and what script language, and what markup language. Freaking disaster is to read your comments, don’t know wether to lough or cry. No shit you will use edge, when you don’t know backend processes and you do not understand them.

Well, one thing’s obvious to me right off the bat: The Preview 6 copy of Adobe EDGE is helluva buggy. Many of the GUI fonts are totally illegible, and the whole proggie crashes if you look at it the wrong way.

Cam Pham

So from my understanding, Flash will eventually become obsolete because omnipresent mobile devices such as the iPhone is not able to download the plugin necessary to play Flash videos/animations. And with the development of HTML5, there is almost no need for Flash. So that is why Adobe foresees this and is developing an alternative to Flash that utilizes technologies such as HTML5 which exports content compatible in almost all mediums such as the iPhone.

Katheryn Hays

The problem with using flash is, in the next few years it will be near obsolete. Apple does not support it, it is a major memory hog, the data inside the flash is not found by search engines, the list goes on and on about the problems with flash. If I can make a website look as good, be as interactive, and load quicker, all without flash, then I am totally game for it. As for why the program itself? Because their other tool, Dreamweaver, is not built for such specifics. Dreamweaver is built for everything web, but CSS animation is so specific, and so enormous of a tool, having its own program is not too much.

All of course, in my own opinion.

web101

Hmm… Dreamweaver with the Timeliness pulled out… wish they had brought it back with jquery in background instead of spry

LOL, Edge is this? No no, Edge is more like Adobe’s Apology for Flash and DreamWeaver. They denied the world a ton of content by developing extremely complicated programs that did not function in any way similar to any other program in the genre. Simply, hundreds of thousands of hours, if not millions, were spent learning awkward backdoor roundabout ways to do things instead of creating useful content.

As someone who thinks the know Dreamweaver on Monday and then runs into another issue that simply makes no sense, but can use any other editor on the planet without a glitch…. I applaud Adobe for bringing to market tools that allow a new designer to start creating quality content in their second week, instead of second year and still find themselves scratching their head 10 years down the line.

In addition, cheers to CS6 Creative Cloud. As a small high end design and development company the prospect of investing $7k / designer for the Master Suite stopped us from hiring several people, now… if they do not work out or if work slows we can just shut off the $50/mo ($30 right now) which has allowed us to hire 2 more and their additions have increased business to the point we are now looking to add more.

Adobe, with products like this and their new business model, has become an ally of our company instead of a begrudged necessity.

I still think that their UX team and their Dreamweaver Dev Team need to meet and they need to do some serious work on the UX of their own sites before they assume the role of a UX authority.

I am a flash developer and now learning HTML 5 and the canvas just because I realize HTML5 will be the best choice for most web pages. Flash will never because still much things cannot be done in html5. I use flash for business application and serious games and surrounded by html5 pages with the JavaScript.
Edge at least helped me in learning HTML5 and I use it to construct animation data and layout. But not for production.

The CSS3 spec is still evolving, and designers are constantly finding new tricks, and sharing them with all the other designers on the Internet. I think that Edge could play a pivotal role in lightweight, but nonetheless attractive animation, which is important in even modern cell phones, which often lack the connection speed, the graphics capabilities, or the battery life to handle Flash.

Snahbah

I heard jQuery uses more battery power than Flash.

illiad

Adobe is now forcing people to do something, by withdrawing flash for mobile from the android market… make those backups quickly!

jonathan schlackman

Now that Android has dropped Flash, an alternative needs to be developed. Edge is a step in that direction.

This crap pisses me off. If someone can build the Doritos website with anything other than Flash I will kiss their ass. Everyone says get rid of flash, but no one is providing a solution for an animation tool for the future of the web. Oh wait, Adobe Edge is set to replace flash.

Enrique

in a programmer perspective it could be right and I could agree with you. In a designer perspective who hate write a piece code it will be a great tool that allow us to create a functional and interactive piece (jquery). I can compared your questions “Designers needs Dreamweaver?

ktam

You are correct today, but will be incorrect in the future. Basically when well implemented HTML 5 is the standard across the majority of all browsers, Flash’s market will reduce to a very small share of high-end websites. Once Flash is no longer profitable it will likely die since it is proprietary. Also, just because a published Flash file in the form of a SWF, hides its own guts, doesn’t mean that a published Edge page should be criticized for having to expose its own guts. Edge is a tool which will find use in the near future. Were I work we already trying to stay away from Flash in any form, but HTML/CSS solutions are still available to us.

darren

Never mind early verisons of Flash, what about the animation panel that used to be in Dreamweaver?! Thats all this is.

Win

What about people developing e-learning and m-learning solutions who are are desperately looking for Flash-like capabilities still missing in HTML5? I feel that my creativity and the learner’s experience is cut-short now that Flash is parked. Hooray for a new tool that strives to get all the Flash tools into HTML5!

Harry

I do think that these kind of tools are great. I don’t have a lot of programming knowledge and they work perfectly for me. A5 HTML5 Animator (www.a5-animator) is similar. I have tried it for free and I like it.

Juanjo Haro

I’m crurrently developping e-learning material in FLash with complex system of control and interface to communicate with the learning platform. Now the client wants to see this material in the damn apple devices (wich can perfectly run Flash except for Apple decision) My skills in actionscript are good but i have no idea of html5, css, jquery and i even don’t know where to begin and problaby my job depends on it. I have discover Edge who can, at least, create a decent control interface and animation for what i do so I love this program.

The html5, the css and the jquery are to make webpages and is lightyears far from Flash in web app creation. Flash is dying? Then why in the fwa.com the most webpages from big entertaiment industries, or designers are made in flash and the have ios app too? Why Facebook declares to park html5?

This languages are standard. Jesus, in a tutorial website i see 3 groups of code lines to move a square, one for Firefox, one for chrome and one for OPera (ie9 not support the animation)… writting a code for every navigator? In my learning works, some animations can take 10 minutes long in the timeline. How the hell is suppossed to code this? If flash dies, which i doubt, the production time of some projects will increase a lot.

Now, i’m looking desperately how to make forward and rewind audio buttons to get syncro with my animations and i don’t find nothing about it but tutorials about combining html5 with js with jquery… please, in flash, i just have to put the audio in the time line and if i press the foward button, there is syncro…

Html5 is for simple webpages and silly animations.

applestalks

all i know is my 5 year old daughter loves my little pony games in flash and that she cannot use them on a mobile platform. tears. it is NOTfor geeks to dictate to families how they should enjoy themselves.

All the Adober edge example are JERKY with just a few ‘hello world’ ballons. Sure Flash hammered the CPU, but that was because it was performing a complex task.

….. the ‘click this ad’ cabal are reducing our lives!

And they ususally just produce a bland white personal site with WW3C approved in the footer…

Me

Flash has dead! HTML5/CSS3 kill it. Dont fuck Adobe!

nickenino

Learn english, learn to read, learn to understand what you read. Apple killed flash for its own sake

Zaker

Not that I think the previous individual will ever read my post but her (Edge) beauty is only skin deep. Though I think that Edge has a place in thie new world to bridge a divide largely created by apple, the truth is that she is currently a very poor substitute. There is currently no tool out there still today that does everything that flash can do with the support and market adoption that Flash has. JavaScript, JQuery and all the other things still don’t have the classes or support across browser or platforms the way that Flash did. For a serious interactive web experience Flash still has no rival. For simple animations, drag and drops, animating divs, sure go use Edge. But if you thought that is what Flash was for you were missing the boat to begin with.

To all those who revel in Flash’s demise, you have no idea what sort of mess you have created for the rest of us. The days of content running in on plugin across all browsers and platforms looking working almost the same are over. Congrats. Now to support a video you need 4 different formats, the asme with audio. Oh, and the support for the audio and video doesn’t work well on half the browsers. JavaScript debugging sucks, development time has doubled and now what I have built doesn’t even work on half the browsers because the support isn’t there. Why did we ditch Flash again? Because Apple got a bug up their ass about performance, or was it because Adobe spanked them when FLV took over the web as the main video format? Give this a thought, most of the sites on the internet are garbage, broken and run poorly, why didn’t Apply block us from going there? So, enjoy your crappy mis-matched web experience for the next 10 years.

While Flash has been doing all the heavy lifting for games, audio and video javascript has been sleeping in and partying. My clients want HTML5 to do all these great things on the web that Flash can do and I have to tell them they can’t start a video on page load of their iPad because video require a user click to initiate. I have to tell them that their iPad won’t play more than one audio track at a time or that audio loop support doesn’t exist across the other 70% of the browsers. JavaScript code is where Flash was 10 years ago and it is going to take javascript 10 years to catch up.

bloodnut

I think Adobe Edge is the new best thing when it comes to creating interactive web design It’s for designers who don’t do code. This allows designers can focus on design and not worry and stress about all the code, script jave etc… i love working and learning in Adobe Edge. And i think people are only waking up to it now..

Felix Hornoiu .com

I work in aftereffect animation and in most of the time I embed a vimeo clip on the web. This tool is great and yet had a lot of things to improve.

Blur, color overlay and almost all AFX function should be embeded.

I dont care about coding, I am a visual thinker, I didnt liked math in highschool.

Sean

To say Adobe Edge Animate will replace Flash is quite the over statement. Edge is a different tool for a different purpose. If you work in web design, you are well aware of the demand to reach mobile users. Mobile device numbers continue to climb and will soon out number desktop/laptops globally. That being said it is vital to have tools that can operate on mobile devices. Flash does not work on most mobile devices. This is where Edge fills a need. By utilizing CSS, jQuery & java script, Edge offers the possibility of still offering animations that are mobile devices ready. By no means are you going to have the same capabilities that Flash currently offers, however as html5 is further developed this could change drastically.

The manner is which software is developed now requires that it can integrate with most systems, in this case browsers + platforms. If this demand is not met when creating new software, there is high risk of failure. When wide spread integration is incorporated into design then it is far simpler for widespread use.

My own take on Edge Animate v1.5 is that although is does feel lacking as far as functionality is some regards, especially compared to Flash, it has been designed to work on most if not all browsers and platforms whether desktop, laptop or other mobile devices. This is the main function and reason to use Edge.

Regarding the comment that everything Edge does can be hand coded is true. However as with Flash there are two types or potential users – user that knows how to code & user that does not know how to code. For users that do no know how to code this themselves it is a simple solution and work around. I’d argue that even for users that know how to code, the program speeds up the process substantially and allows for real design to take place. Either way some of us designers prefer to put an emphasis on the visual design more so than the coding going into a project.

I have just started using Edge Animate and found it quite simple to use and very robust. By no means is it as polished as I’d like in some regards but I do fully anticipate this program to be continually developed as web standards increase as well as the demand for mobile device. Most limitations I’ve noticed to date are due to the necessity for integration. Just don’t fool yourself into thinking Flash is all you need or that Edge Animate is a newer Flash. They are still two distinct relevant programs.

kazım

dont you think its productions are multiplatfrorm..

nebulabase

There should be a poll asking ‘How must time will pass until ‘We Choose the Moon’ can be recreated with HTML5?’ I would be inclined to check the ‘Never’ box.

Dave

After that sentence “From my perspective most website animation falls into two categories.”, I stopped reading. Websites will become more and more interactive and rich. You are focusing on the past. Soon you won’t be able to categorize websites. I think websites will take over the apps world. People are tired of having to pick one system from another: Android or Apple. Specially after the latest scandals.

Črni Žec

actually websites are going more and more minimalistic. check the latest 5 year statistic.

Kimon Matara

I’m sorry but that’s such an arbitrary statement. 5 year statistic on what?

Armen Michaeli

I disagree. First of all, CSS and HTML and the other things usually accompanying them (like JavaScript) are not merely for the Web today. The technologies now are able to support a wide variety of applications and starting your argument with “What websites need this?” puts you in a very bad position already, argument-wise. Is an online adventure game designer a website? Technically, yes, but surely that’s now what you meant? How about a presentation? Wouldn’t it be wise to animate it with a tool like Edge. Mind you, I agree with the fact that Edge is painfully underfeatured currently, but the idea in fact is very good – I know several people, animators and scripters mostly, who need what Flash gives them, but hate working with Flash.
Second, if Flash let people do A, and then Edge (assuming it can give them same power, which it doesn’t unfortunately) lets them do A, then they will use Edge because the platform it targets is becoming more ubiqous.
Third, you CAN recreate a site like “We choose the Moon” easily and handily, in shorter time, and with more satisfaction from a developer, trust me on that please. If you can’t, try to talk to the developers that are proficient in todays Web tech, they will praise it, from my experience. Flash was a stop gap measure to bring interactivity to a fragmented Web in a rather sorry state of things, but today it is the other way around – such is the way of progress. The thing is, people never wanted Flash, but had to make do with it while browser vendors took their time realizing how their incapacity to work together on standards held the entire Internet aback, before cooperating with W3 and others to give users and developers what they always wanted. The Web is unique in the way that it is one of the open technologies we still have, that anyone can use freely, user or developer. Adobe tried to apply their commercial model – a proprietary technology – to the tradionally open Web, which the Web body ultimately rejected, after a long and painful attempt to integrate it.

Every job has its set of tools. You use a hammer to push nails on a wall but you don’t use it to screw screws. You don’t use your bare hands either.
Likewise, you use Adobe Edge for some projects but not for everything. I had to design interactive e-learning courses with tons of animated stuff and minutes of duration that would be able to run smoothly on any device. Animating with code using libraries like GSAP for example proved to require tremendous effort and huge amounts of testing. With edge animate along with GSAP i can produce a course per day ! Still, i don’t use Edge Animate for anything else… So… Excelent tools, yet, as everything else not a replacement for something else.

*Old post but for the record i wanted to share my experience :)

Peter Milliagn

As someone who is just starting out to create my own website adobe edge is a godsend. It makes things so much easier for us beginner’s, so anything that makes things easier cant be a bad thing. Well done adobe.

airtonix

I don’t care what tool the animation is created with, but PLEASE for the effing love of his noodly appendages…. stop enforcing a deployment bundle structure…

Let me enforce rules that my designers should :
1. use Bourbon and SCSS as the style language
2. exclude the use of JS animations
3. only export scss and haml/jade

Modern and Professional websites/web-applications have very strict guidelines about how assets are prepared and deployed… Adobe Edge is basically taking us back to Frontpage and Dreamweaver days where they vomit code with no regard as to how it exists along side the rest of the project.

Bruce

To answer your question, yes you are a snob. You don’t understand the fundamental difference between Flash and Animate, but first let me address your snobbishness. Whichever you choose, Flash or Animate, it’s a tool. In the wrong hands, any tool can be a bad thing. In the right hands, any tool can be a wonderful thing. Your apparent refusal to recognize this makes you a snob. You look at the examples of bad design and think everyone will be designing like that with Animate because of the bad Flash designs that are apparently stuck in your craw. Because, you know, you’re so much better than anyone else. No, you’re just a snob who can’t see the big picture because you don’t think it benefits you. I used to use Flash, but the coders took over and ruined it for anyone who was a designer. As RightBrainLeftWorld relates, just using Flash started to give me a headache so I completely abandoned it, which pissed me off. Now Animate has made creating interactive DESIGNS a wonderful experience. Is there some coding involved? Yes, but nothing I can’t handle or get help with that doesn’t make my head explode. Now for the difference between EA and Flash: EA is for more than just web sites! It’s good for creating apps. It’s good for creating things that Flash is no good for. Flash can’t run on mobile devices. Flash is now pretty much only good for creating corporate training, and even that is going away. With just HTML5, CSS and JS, EA can run on just about any device or computer. Will there be some crappy designs and unnecessary animations put out there? Yes, but that’s happened ever since the first drawing and painting tools were used on cave walls. To say “This tool shouldn’t be in existence because someone might make something ugly with it.” is the height of arrogance and destructive.

Nin Abayata

The learning curve for Adobe Edge Animate is shorter for web developers. Animate is built for the web. The thing I love the most about Animate is it publishes animation that works on all major browsers and mobile devices. Some naysayers may say that majority of devices can run Flash, but the web is developing at a rapid pace that’s aiming to make all components accessible to everyone– no plugins needed. Apple does not allow Flash on iPhones and future mobile devices and it seems that there are breakthroughs like HTML5 that makes Flash a thing of the past.

Flash is a very limiting solution and Edge Animate is a springboard to web animation technologies that may be developed in the future. Animate is not as flexible as Flash in creating easier and robust animations (and should not replace Flash) but it definitely is the thing for the web.

chastua

My position is this: If Adobe can’t even make a flash player that works across different platforms and has a myriad of unresolved problems, why would you trust any product with the Adobe name on it? I used to watch YouTube all the time, stream local news, etc. Now those sites are generally unwatchable. It has been that way for weeks, if not months, with little or no improvement. That company should be out of business by now. Are you paying attention competition?

LearnVault

As an eLearning developer, this is vital. I also use it for my banners on my website – which I could code by hand but it is just quicker to use edge.

Chad

It’s surprising no one has mentioned using Adobe Animate as a tool for building interactive prototypes. To truly develop the most valuable and delightful digital experiences, designers these days must test interactive prototypes in the hands of users early and often. There are a handful of prototyping tools starting to pop up. Adobe Animate seems to fall in a sweet spot between easy to use but technically limiting tools (ex: InVision, Pixate) and more complicated but virtually limitless code based tools (ex: Framer.js). Animate challenges designers to learn enough code to create more complex interaction designs in their prototypes and have a better dialogue with developers. However, it does not require they become engineers.

KD

funny, in hindsight now that most popular browsers are no longer going to support flash….

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